After they walked a few more steps, Yue Lin opened her mouth.
"We need to be more careful," she said. "We got lucky that they had low cultivation realms. If I had to guess… they were all around mid-stage Inner Essence Realm. The leader might've barely reached late stage."
Riven gave a small nod. That matched what he'd thought too.
One shouldn't assume the bandits were weak.
In fact, without a sect, most people never even began cultivating.
Even if someone got lucky and found an old manual or some technique, they might lack the talent or foundation to make use of it.
Most people either didn't cultivate or were stuck in the foundational stages before the Inner Essence realm.
Even for Riven he had to brave the danger of fighting a semi-feral bear to get what he needed to advance.
So for cultivators to show up outside of sects or family clans — and reach mid or late Inner Essence on their own — meant they weren't nobodies.
Not at all.
They just picked the wrong targets.
Riven adjusted the strap on his pouch, brushing a few leaves off his sleeve.
He'd got some blood on his sleeves from retrieving the needle.
They traveled for a few more hours after that — quieter, more alert.
Avoiding areas where the trees thinned too far or the sounds of beasts grew too sharp.
Riven led using the map, checking its lines by the fading light. Eventually, the trees began to break apart more regularly. The earth sloped upward, and the wind grew thinner and colder.
Ahead, dark cliffs and craggy hills rose into view — peaks marked by long striations of stone, curled and carved by years of constant wind.
Galecrag Hills.
They had arrived.
The trees thinned into scattered, stubborn pines clinging to dry soil. The ground shifted beneath their feet — soft forest floor giving way to coarse stone and jagged gravel. The wind that passed through was no longer filtered by branches or leaves. It blew sharp and cold, funneling between ridgelines in restless gusts.
Ahead, the terrain unfolded in layers.
The Galecrag Hills were less like rolling mounds and more like a cracked spine of the world — slabs of grey rock piled high like toppled walls, craggy outcroppings rising at uneven angles. Long gouges were carved into their sides, as if a giant had once raked claws across the hills and left them scarred.
Riven scanned the path forward, boots crunching over brittle shale. The terrain narrowed into sloped passes and knife-edged ridgelines, with sheer drops to either side in places. Cracks split across the path, some small enough to step over, others wide enough to swallow a careless traveler.
Still… it wasn't the terrain that made him slow down.
It was the quiet.
A strange stillness pressed against his ears.
No birds. No insects. No chirping, rustling, or shifting. Even the wind — constant as it was — seemed to hush when it passed through the stones.
It was like the entire hill range was holding its breath.
He hadn't expected a chorus of birds — but the silence still felt wrong. According to what he'd read, there were supposed to be small animals here. Rock weasels, cliff-bats, even a type of hopping fox.
And yet, nothing moved. Nothing called.
Riven paused, frowning. "It's too quiet."
Yue Lin said nothing, but she was already scanning the cliffs above, eyes narrowed, hand drifting toward the knife holstered beneath her dress.
They moved forward cautiosly.
From the records, Gale Scorpions were daylight hunters. They roamed solo or in very small groups, fast and efficient — but always returned to a shared nest at night. A clan structure.
"It should be their hunting time right now," Riven muttered, lowering his voice out of instinct. "If we're lucky, we might find a few strays."
He glanced around the stone around them.
"Be careful. Their bodies are grey — they can blend into the cliffs pretty easily."
The path they followed narrowed, sloping upward into a deep crease between two ridges. Stone walls rose steeply on either side, and the trail beneath their feet thinned to a single-person width. They had to walk in a line.
Yue Lin led.
Riven followed.
The cliffs pressed in closer as they climbed. Cracks spidered across the shale, and tufts of pale mountain grass jutted from between the stones.
"I see an opening up ahead," Yue Lin called softly over her shoulder. "Looks like it opens onto a plateau or ledge."
Riven lifted his head to look.
Then she added, "But the path's broken. It cuts off here. We'll have to climb the rest."
She stepped forward and pressed her hand against the rock — testing the angle — then raised her high foot to pull herself up.
She didn't make it far.
Her leg halted awkwardly mid-motion, the fabric of her dress tightening across her hips and thigh. She tried again — smaller step this time — but the cloth resisted, and she had to stop completely. With a faint, irritated exhale, she braced one hand against the stone and the other against her dress, trying to adjust the fold enough to lift her leg higher.
Riven blinked.
He wasn't exactly surprised.
In fact he'd been wondering the whole time why she would wear a dress like that for their trip out.
It was a sleek, elegant red dress — fitted at the waist, made for graceful entrances and slow steps under lamplight. Perfect for a banquet.
But that was it.
Somehow, it hadn't tripped her up during the duels there or the guild match and bandit fight.
He didn't know how.
But it was absolutely not meant for cliff climbs or close combat.
She looked like she'd just stepped out of a ballroom.
Which was surreal considering their current location.
At least she isn't wearing heels.
Ahead of him, Yue Lin finally managed to adjust the hem enough to move again. She turned her head slightly as if sensing his stare.
"…What?" she asked.
Riven scratched the back of his neck. "Just wondering why you're dressed like that for a scorpion hunt."
She blinked once, then looked down at herself. The tips of her ears flushed faintly pink.
"I didn't pack anything else," she said — then corrected herself quickly. "I mean— I usually wear practical gear. Like yours."
She glanced down at the dress, fingers brushing the fabric lightly.
"This was my first time going to a formal banquet," she admitted. "I wanted to… dress up. Just once."
A small pause.
"During the fights there, I already realized it wasn't ideal for combat. A little restrictive. But…" her voice dropped almost to a murmur, "it still felt nice to wear."
Riven blinked again.
He looked at the slight blush forming on her cheeks.
Is this really the same girl that killed bandits without any change in expression?
Yue Lin continued, eyes flicking away as if embarrassed to be explaining this much.
"After the banquet, we went straight to Bosu's shop. And then the guild. And then… we left the city."
She exhaled softly. "I didn't realize that I should probably change, until we were already far enough that turning back would've been stupid."
She touched the hem again, almost absently.
"I didn't want to bring it up. It's fine. I can keep it clean with qi, and I'll just have to be careful in fights."
Riven couldn't help himself, giving a comment. "At least you didn't wear heels."
She shot him a sideways look. "…I'm not that unreasonable."
Then, determined, she crouched slightly and reached beneath the subtle fold of her dress — to the thigh holster hidden there. She drew her slim pale-bladed knife.
With two clean flicks, she cut narrow slits along either side of the dress — just up to the mid thigh.
"Should help," she said.
Her tone was a bit more steady now.
More like the quiet, dangerous girl he'd been traveling with since yesterday.
She rose in one fluid motion, sliding the blade back into its sheath. Then she lifted a hand and tucked a few strands of wind-blown hair behind her ear.
The breeze caught her dress as she stood. The now-looser fabric danced gently around her legs, silk-thin and flowing. Her white hair shimmered faintly in the light, stirred by the mountain air, framing her face in loose waves. Her cheeks still held the faintest trace of pink — ears too.
She didn't seem to notice.
But Riven did.
Just for a second — a breath — she looked almost unreal. Like something caught between a memory and a mirage.
Then her eyes lifted and met his.
Riven's breath hitched. He looked up — quickly — as if the sheer cliff face above her had become the most fascinating thing in the world.
That's when his expression shifted.
"Watch out!"